PRISMA Shipper Event 2019 – A Full Round-Up
Agile Project Manager
Content
The annual PRISMA Shipper event is always a major landmark on our company calendar, providing a chance to meet and engage with our users, collect feedback, and exchange ideas about how to enhance our platform and services. With the 2019 edition coming to a close last week, it’s time to take stock and look back at another fruitful get-together.
It’s certainly been a busy year at PRISMA. With a comprehensive platform revamp, an office move, and a significant expansion of our team counted among our endeavours in 2019, there was certainly a lot to share with our users when they visited our home in Leipzig last week for our annual two-day Shipper event.
Given the scope of change that we’ve seen at PRISMA in recent times, and indeed the continued fast-paced evolution of the gas industry as a whole, we decided that this year’s event should take on a more expansive form that broadened the focus beyond PRISMA itself.
Among the fresh elements we introduced for 2019 were training sessions for users to learn more about the secondary market, keynote speakers external to PRISMA, one-on-one sessions with PRISMA team members, and a behind-the-scenes tour of our new offices. Here’s how the two days panned out…
Day One
Early afternoon, guests assembled at our offices in downtown Leipzig where they were given a warm welcome by the awaiting PRISMA team. In our conference room, Frederick and René, key members of our Customer Success team, broke the ice with some introductory words, laying out the proposed schedule for the 48 hours ahead.
There followed our first talk of the day by Heiko Lohmann, journalist for the annual Energate gas market report, who offered his insights into current gas industry trends, the political appetite for supporting the sector, and the main regulatory challenges faced by companies operating within it.
Next up on the stage was Henrich von Kopp-Colomb, Head of Customer Service at Open Grid Europe. During his illuminating talk, Mr Von Kopp-Colomb delivered an overview of his organisation’s efforts in the field of energy transition, elucidating on how they propose to reach 100% carbonisation with the help of renewable power and gas, and the urgency to start now if they are to hit climate protection goals.
Following these opening two talks, guests were invited to take a tour of our offices in small groups led by members of the PRISMA team. In each department, a team member was on hand to illustrate the division’s day-to-day responsibilities and operations, and demonstrate the tools and systems used, such as automatic testing, auction monitoring, and others. As well as offering a useful insight into our working practices, this also allowed users to put faces to the names of people they would typically only speak with by phone.
Once the tours were over, proceedings moved to the impressive environs of Club International, Leipzig’s first City Club and housed within a tastefully restored mansion. Here, guests were able to relax, unwind and socialise at their leisure, while enjoying a mouth-watering BBQ cooked up in the grounds of the building.
Day Two
After some hard-earned rest, our guests returned for day two, which kicked off with more enlightening talks by distinguished industry figures.
First up was Areti Kostaraki, a legal advisor at Entsog (The European Network of Transmission System Operators for Gas), who gave us an informative overview of the gas market’s legal framework. She was followed by Bert Martens, Sales Support Manager at gas pipeline operator Fluxys, who discussed his company’s ongoing commercial partnership with PRISMA.
Next to speak was Yngve Torvanger, Tarriff manager at TAP (Trans Adriatic Pipeline AG), who updated us on the progress of the ongoing project to build a southern gas corridor connecting Azerbaijan to Europe via southern Italy.
The final talk of the morning was from Joerg Ehmke, Managing director of gas pricing hub Gaspool, who discussed a number of pertinent issues within the gas sector, including plans to merge the two German market areas into one nationwide zone.
Next it was time to hand over the reins to Pedro, PRISMA’S Customer Success representative, for a live training session on how to get the most out of the secondary market. This interactive element to the day proved a big hit with our audience, many of whom enjoyed the chance to get hands-on with our service with the expert guidance of PRISMA team members.
Following a hearty lunch break, the stage was once again given over to a number of speakers, the first being Daniele Agosto, Access Contract Manager at Italian energy company Snam. During his talk, Mr Agosto spoke about tariff updates, capacity booking trends, and Snam’s plans for creating new products for storage.
Then it was time for Eduard Thamm, DevOps Engineer at PRISMA, who discussed security, the benefits of conducting penetration tests, and actionable intelligence. He was then followed by PRISMA Product Managers, Adrian Makohon and Svenja Kruse, who presented a summary of the upcoming changes to our platform, including user management enhancements, data visualisation, and a new bidding avenue.
Bringing our 2019 Shipper event to a conclusion, we organised an interactive workshop to give our users a deep dive into the usage and usability of some key PRISMA features. The overarching purpose of the workshop was for us to observe how shippers engage with these features and inform our thinking over how we may wish to fine-tune it.
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Event location on a map
